Airborne
by Sgt. Moffitt
Summary: It was a Father's Day gift to his father and grandfather, but Tony got the best gift of all.


_A/N: I don't own Hogan's Heroes and I don't get paid for this; it is truly a labor of love._

_Many thanks to the folks from the Yankee Air Museum of Belleville, Michigan, who provided me and many others with an unforgettable trip aboard the "Yankee Lady" on June 9, 2012._

_Among my fellow passengers on that flight was a World War II veteran who had been an aerial gunner. It was my great privilege and pleasure to meet this gentleman, and I dedicate this story to him, with heartfelt thanks for his service to our country._

* * *

"It's the chance of a lifetime, Tony."

I looked over at my father. We were enjoying a long weekend at the lake, and I was hoping to just laze around the next day, and have a cookout for Father's Day on Sunday. That was about the extent of my ambition, I must confess.

But since he retired a few months ago, Dad's developed all sorts of enthusiasms, and I could only wonder what this one was all about. I really hoped it wouldn't entail any exertion on my part.

So, with a touch of trepidation, I asked him, "What do you mean?"

Dad pulled a brochure from his pocket, but before he handed it to me, he cast a quick glance at Grandpa, who was strolling down toward the lake and had just moved out of earshot. "Your grandfather said something to me about this in passing last week, and I decided to look into it. Here."

I took the colorful pamphlet from him. _"FLY IN THE B-17**"**_ was in bold letters on the cover. I flipped it open and ran my eye over it...apparently a person could arrange for a ride on a restored World War II bomber, in exchange for a reasonably modest donation.

_Amazing,_ I thought. _You couldn't pay me to get on one of those things, but my **grandfather** is interested in doing this? _

And then I remembered that before he became a POW in Germany, Grandpa had been an aerial gunner. That was all I knew; Grandpa, like so many of his contemporaries, never talked about the war.

I looked up from the pamphlet. "You really think Grandpa wants to go up in one of those crates? My God, this thing must be seventy years old!"

"Fully restored," Dad pointed out. "It's perfectly safe. And it's not like it's taking off from a large airport; the flight will be from Pellston."

He had a point; Pellston is not one of the busiest places on the planet. On a good day, maybe three planes take off from there.

But I was still doubtful. "And they'll let a man of his age go on one of these flights?"

"They will; I called to check. But I don't want him going alone, of course."

"Of course. So, are you going to…" I stopped as Dad shook his head and indicated his casted foot. He had broken a bone in it doing a kick in karate class, karate being one of his new-found enthusiasms.

"I can't go with him," he said, with a sigh of regret. Then his eyes brightened. "But you can!"

"What!" I stared at him. "Hey, I don't get on airplanes, you know that! Especially seventy year old airplanes."

"You really need to get over that silly fixation of yours." Dad's tone was crisp. "And your grandfather is eighty-nine. This might be his last chance to do such a thing…and it's the chance of a lifetime for you, Tony."

"But…" My voice trailed off as I watched my grandfather walking by the sparkling waters of the lake, obviously enjoying the morning sunshine. He was singing to himself; I could faintly hear "Santa Lucia" drifting to us on the breeze.

My father cleared his throat, and I turned my head to look at him. "Look, son, I really want to do this for my dad, as a Father's Day gift to him." He paused, and gave me a grin. "And as a Father's Day gift to _me,_ would you please go with him?"

I sighed. When he put it like that, how could I refuse?

…

So the next morning Grandpa and I drove over to Pellston, in search of adventure. When we arrived, we discovered a group of thirty or so people who had come to see the vintage plane. I left Grandpa shooting the breeze with a Vietnam veteran while I went to see about the tickets Dad had arranged.

An elderly gentleman seated at a table looked up as I approached. "Are you going to be flying today?"

"Yes, my grandfather and I are."

"Name?"

"Anthony Garlotti."

"And your grandfather?"

"Anthony Garlotti."

The man smiled. "Thought I was hearing double there for a minute. Must be a little confusing, with the two of you sharing the same name."

He didn't know the half of it. My father's name is Anthony too, and he's been known as Tony Junior all his life. And they call me Tony Three. Yeah, really. You'd think my parents could have come up with another name, something different, you know?

_When I have a kid,_ I told myself, _he's going to have a name of his own. No way will there be another Tony._

The arrangements completed, Grandpa and I made our way to the edge of the tarmac of the little airport. It was a beautiful clear day in June, and we shaded our eyes as we looked up, searching for the source of the droning we could hear overhead.

"There!" Grandpa pointed a gnarled finger toward the north where a speck was visible. The speck became larger and larger as it slowly circled the airport, and as it neared us I watched in amazement. The old aircraft was not what I expected.

She was beautiful: sleek and graceful, and shining silver in the sun. I said as much to Grandpa, and he nodded. "Beautiful but tough. Those birds could take a lot of punishment and still make it back to base."

The B-17 swooped in for a landing, and it touched down as lightly as a feather. All around us people had their digital cameras out, clicking away madly. I took a few photos myself, but Grandpa just watched, smiling.

As the plane taxied toward us, I could feel my heart pounding. I told myself that there was nothing to be afraid of...people flew all over the world and had been doing it for over a hundred years, for Pete's sake. I'd studied aerodynamics and I knew, intellectually, just how planes are able to fly. But instinctively, I also knew there was no way that tons of steel could stay up in the air. And it didn't help to think about how old these particular tons of steel were.

But I squashed down my fears as I gazed at the plane. She was just as beautiful up close, with a wingspan that was impressive; over a hundred feet at least. I hadn't realized, though, how small the fuselage was. How on earth could a ten-man crew, complete with parachutes, ever fit inside?

I supposed I would find out soon enough, since twelve of us would be passengers today, in addition to a three-man crew. The pilot and copilot introduced themselves, and then went to do their pre-flight check. The third member of the crew, an elderly man who appeared to be in his seventies, gave us instructions, which were actually pretty simple.

We were to stay strapped in until the plane was in flight, and then we would be free to move about the plane and explore.

_Fat chance,_ I thought. _I'm not budging an inch once we get underway. If I live that long._

I helped Grandpa climb aboard into an alarmingly cramped space. The tail-gunner section was far aft, and the compartment that the gunner had to squeeze into seemed impossibly small. Then we came forward again, and we saw the two waist-gunner positions, which were staggered so the two gunners would not bump into each other.

What really got me, though, was the ball turret under our feet. Looking down at it, it had all the appearance of a Plexiglas sphere with room only for a small man to curl up inside, like a hamster in a hamster ball. I'm not particularly claustrophobic, but that really gave me the willies. Farther forward was the radio section, then the bomb bay with a narrow catwalk that stretched over it to connect to the cockpit. There was an opening in the floor of the cockpit that led to the nose of the plane, beneath and forward of the pilot and copilot. Here was navigator's station and also the bombardier's seat; we were told that he also acted as nose-gunner when necessary.

We took our seats in the radio section just aft of the bomb bay. I was squeezed in the radioman's seat, Grandpa was to my right, and the Vietnam vet, complete with cane, sat behind him.

Our elderly steward checked to make sure all seatbelts were secure, and then, with a rumble and a roar, the plane was in motion.

_Please don't throw up,_ I told my stomach. But would it listen?

Fortunately, it did. I didn't even get the dropping-away sensation that I've read about. I glanced across at my grandfather, who seemed cool as a cucumber. And when I reflected that his last trip in a B-17 involved getting shot down, his composure seemed even more remarkable.

I wasn't prepared for the noise, a continuous roar that made conversation impossible. Nor was I prepared for the constant swaying motion and the stiff breeze that swept through the plane. I risked a glance out the small window, and steeled myself against the nausea that was sure to come. But it didn't.

We were airborne! And I had survived! I looked across at my grandfather, but he was no longer there. The Vietnam vet was gone, too, and I realized that they must be exploring the plane.

Well, how about that. An eighty-nine year old and a sixty-something guy with a cane were up and about, and here I was, a perfectly healthy thirty-two year old, clinging to my seat and afraid to move.

I took a deep breath, and unfastened my seatbelt. It was difficult getting to my feet; the swaying motion of the plane made it hard to keep my balance. But I stood up, and looked aft, where Grandpa and the Vietnam vet were standing at the waist-gunner turrets, peering out through the Plexiglas. Grabbing whatever solid surfaces that came to hand, I made my way aft to stand beside my grandfather.

It was far too noisy to speak, and I'm not sure what I would have said anyway. Something along the lines of: _I__s this gun like the one you had to use? How did it feel? Were you scared?_

Grandpa pointed to the window, and through it I could see the serene blue of the Straits of Mackinac far below, and a lone freighter that was making its lazy way eastward under the Mackinac Bridge. So beautiful, so peaceful, and so different from what the gunner must have seen as the bomber formation moved over Germany…

As I touched the machine gun, I noticed with surprise that my hands were now encased in thick leather gloves. The roaring of the engines was muffled by the helmet covering my head, my sneakers had become heavy boots, and my shirt and shorts were now a sheepskin-lined jacket and heavy trousers.

And yet I was cold, with a deep, numbing, bone-chilling cold. We must be at a much higher altitude now...the Straits of Mackinac could no longer be seen, but a miniature, unfamiliar patchwork lay far, far below, difficult to see clearly as my line of vision was impeded by my goggles and the oxygen mask I wore.

A voice could be heard through my headphones: "Messerschmitts at ten o'clock! Get 'em, boys!"

I automatically checked my weapon and then peered through the Plexiglas at the ominous dots approaching. I fired off a few rounds, the fifty vibrating in my hands like a live thing, but the dots became larger and larger, and they were firing back. Then a burst of flak obscured everything, and the plane shuddered violently…we'd been hit!

Smoke filled the compartment as the plane lurched from side to side, and I heard shouts through my headphones. I desperately tried to remember the procedure for bailing out, and panicked when I thought of my best buddy Roy, only a few feet away, but in the nose of the plane with a separate escape hatch. Would he make it out? Could I even make it to my own escape hatch?

_Are we going down? I don't want to die!_

Then my vision cleared, the smoke was gone, and the roaring of the engines was in my ears as I looked down on the Straits of Mackinac again. The intense cold was gone too, replaced by a mild breeze; I was comfortable once more in my shirt and shorts. I felt a tug on my sleeve and turned my head to see Grandpa beside me. He indicated with a jerk of his head that we should resume our seats.

Shaken by my incredible experience, I obeyed.

I sat down and checked my grandfather's seat belt before I fastened my own, and soon we were approaching the little airport. My ears popped a bit as we lost altitude, but thankfully my stomach stayed in place and we touched down with scarcely a jolt.

As I helped Grandpa get off the plane, I didn't know what to say. What had happened back there as we were airborne? Had I somehow tapped into my grandfather's memories? Was that what he had experienced, nearly seventy years ago?

I gazed at him, and it was as though I had never seen him before. Sure, I had learned about World War II in school, and I'd seen movies, but I had never really understood what it had meant for my grandfather.

Today, for a few terrifying moments, I felt what he must have felt, as a nineteen year old caught up in a desperate and deadly situation. He had been only a kid, who should have been just starting out in the world: going to college, meeting girls, having fun.

Instead, he and his entire generation had the fate of the world riding on their shoulders. They weren't consulted on the decisions made by Churchill and Roosevelt; they only knew that the great evil created by Hitler and the Japanese war machine had to be stopped. They had done their job, done it bravely and done it well; and when the job was done, the ones who survived came back home and got on with their lives, without fuss or fanfare.

I looked at my grandfather again, and tears pricked my eyes. I suddenly realized something that I must always have known, deep down inside.

_How honored I am to bear his name._

I'm not a demonstrative kind of guy, but I put my arm around his shoulders and gave him a hug.

When he looked at me inquiringly, I smiled.

"Grandpa, if I ever have a son, I'm going to name him Tony…after you."

* * *

_A/N: Tony Garlotti was a featured character in the episode "The Pizza Parlor"._


End file.
